


Untended

by 221b_hound



Series: Unkissed [34]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Embarrassed John, Frustrated John, Hand Jobs, Horny John, M/M, Masturbation, Scarf Kink, caught wanking, mild restraints
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-02
Updated: 2015-03-02
Packaged: 2018-03-15 22:26:39
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,203
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3464327
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/221b_hound/pseuds/221b_hound
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John is generally pretty darned happy with his love life - it's not Sherlock's responsibility to manage John's persistent erections, and John is usually content to chase his orgasms in the shower, with his honeybee's voice providing inspiration from the hall. But John's hand injuries mean he hasn't been able to relieve the stress all week, and he's getting frustrated. Then he's horribly embarrassed when Sherlock catches him with one of Sherlock's old silk scarves. The good news is that Sherlock has learned a lot about how this works between them. Plus, very possibly, this is for science.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Untended

**Author's Note:**

> I keep forgetting - those interested in the Redbubble Unkissed designs, [they're over here.](http://www.redbubble.com/people/narrelleharris/collections/362000-unkissed)

Ten days after the warehouse – nine days after Milverton's death – John was lying in his old upstairs bed feeling fractious, frustrated and deeply annoyed with himself. 

Partly this was related to his continued nights of disturbed sleep, which included dreams he'd not had for years, since he was a child (and that awful day) and others that were new, raw echoes of his worst day in Helmand, his nearly last day anywhere, that he’d never dreamed before.

He woke up crying out, sometimes, and sometimes simply crying. But never alone. There was that, at least – the arms that held him and the voice that soothed him and the warm body and beating heart that let him take shelter without asking him to explain. He would one day, of course he would. But not yet.

(John wasn’t sure why he wanted to hold those bits of his past so close. It was not as though he thought Sherlock wouldn’t understand. But to say them out loud would be to make them more real, surely. To bring them back to life and make them worse, and they were bad enough. They’d dissolve in time. They had before. They would again, without making him say them. Relive them.)

John’s unhappy state also partly related to his still healing hands and partly… Well, partly because he had spent the day at Lord Kilbraith’s private library doing research for Sherlock's latest case, and watching Sherlock climb up and down ladders, reaching for high shelves – revealing slivers of creamy skin on his back, waist and belly in the gap between shirt and trousers – and bending to low ones – displaying the lovely curve of his arse – had left him incredibly and irretrievably horny. 

Any other time, John responding to Sherlock’s very beautiful body would not have been a big deal. If cuddles weren’t going to cut it and Sherlock didn’t seem to be in the mood to _lend a hand_ , he could always have a nice wank in the shower, thinking about his beautiful boy. Sherlock would sometimes stand at the door and talk to him – of science or sunsets or nothing at all, letting his voice go deep and act as a further aphrodisiac for John’s desires.

Sometimes John had a nice slow wank in bed, too, thinking about Sherlock’s large, elegant hands and his luscious, kissable mouth and his long, muscular legs and his gorgeous, lush backside to the point of distraction. Sometimes it was a pretty quick wank, actually, with that kind of stimulation, and it was all pretty fucking splendid, thank you very much. 

But Sherlock was out on a minor case, and John still had to be careful of getting his bandages wet in any case and, damn it all, he just couldn’t get a proper _grip_.

The fingers of his left hand were still in splints and would be for another ten days at least. Useless for wrapping around a demanding erection.

The second degree burns on the heel of his palm and on his wrist were still problematic. The burn in his neck was mostly healed – it had been the last of the burns when the cigarette had lost some of its potency – but his hands were slower, and he’d caused the palm to bleed again on more than one occasion. He could hold things with his fingers but his palm hurt too much to ignore. 

John tried to blank the desire from his system instead, and it was that failure that was making him so annoyed on top of being fractious and frustrated.

Because normally, John was very content with his sex life, but right now he was horny but wank-handicapped and John could not get his raging hard on to go away with either hand or fierce thinking about ice baths, snot-smeared children at the clinic or Phil Anderson. He reminded himself that nobody had ever died from being horny. They had become extremely grumpy, maybe, and once they may have been inspired to mash a bag of frozen peas on the spot indicated because getting an improper erection at his older sister’s birthday party (his sister’s flatmate and his sister’s flatmate’s boyfriend both being so distractingly sexy and distractingly drunk-necking in a corner that a teenaged boy could hardly keep from imagining threesomes in his room which was only two steps down the hall) but nobody had actually died. Not even from embarrassment.

John did not even consider calling Sherlock. Sherlock was working for one, and for two, which was probably actually one, John’s unmanageable erections were not Sherlock's responsibility. The fact he found Sherlock's body desirable was not something Sherlock played on or teased with. The fact that he couldn’t help responding with desire to Sherlock’s body (and mind and heart) in no way obliged Sherlock to _do_ anything about it.

Initially, John thought that if he just ignored the problem long enough, it would go away. It often did. But not this time. The bastard.

The thing was, John normally masturbated a few times a week – from desire, for stress relief, because Sherlock was out and he was bored, because it felt nice – and this week had been stressful and painful. He wanted the relief that came from orgasm. He wanted to get off while thinking about Sherlock. It was a habit he had – one he liked – but now he couldn't act on it and it was driving him a little bonkers. 

He'd even had to leave their bed and go upstairs because lying there, hard, with only the maddening touch of fingers and his palms too sore and the scent of Sherlock in their sheets, had almost reduced him to frustrated tears.

Lying naked on the upstairs bed, John glared at his erection and then he gave it a piece of his mind.

“Fuck off. Go on. Piss off, you bloody nuisance. You complete dickweasel. What are you waiting for, a flag to fly off you? I don’t fucking need you. Go away. You utter prick.”

Venting wasn’t very satisfying, however, no matter how sneering his voice, when addressed to his _actual_ utter prick.

So then John got another idea. A better idea.

Or so it seemed.

He got up, poked around in the cupboard for a few minutes and came up with one of Sherlock’s old scarves. Not his habitual blue one, but a silky grey one, threaded through with white, that had been worn more for decoration rather than warmth on a case once. They’d dressed formally for that, and Sherlock had looked smashing in the tux.

John held the fabric to his face and inhaled. It still smelled faintly of Sherlock’s aftershave.

Back on the bed, sitting upright against the pillows, John managed to pin part of the scarf under his thigh and brought the rest of it up between his legs and over his cock. He pressed his fingers to the end that poked out from under his leg. The other end he put in his teeth. Then he pulled his head back to make the cloth sit tight over his cock, held tight to the other end, and begun to rut up against it.

 _God. Yes. God, that was nice_. The soft, silky pressure. The faint scent of Sherlock wafting up. The, oh god, blessed relief of friction up the shaft and – when he altered the angle of his moving hips – over the head, _thank you Jesus_ , that was fucking wonderful. _Yes. God. Yes…_

“John?” The voice called up the stairs, accompanied by the sound of feet on the steps.

John froze and was about to spit out the scarf (hide the evidence!) when the door opened.

“That was rather simpler than…. Oh.”

John squeezed his eyes shut so that he didn’t have to see his husband’s raised eyebrows and mouth in an O of surprise and the flash of merriment that had already started to flare in those pale blue eyes…

“Don’t laugh.”

“I’m not laughing.”

And he wasn’t. The effort was damn near discernable. The sound of Sherlock deducing things was only slightly louder.

“I just… need a minute. Okay? Can you go downstairs and I’ll… I’ll be right there.

Naturally, Sherlock stepped into the room and closed the door. “Don’t be embarrassed,” Sherlock said.

“I’m not,” said John, though that was clearly a lie.

“It’s not as if you are having an affair with your penis behind my back, John. I know you masturbate.”

“Not generally with your clothes,” mumbled John, red-faced and looking away. The scarf was still pinned under his thigh, though it was now draped over his still very erect erection. A damp spot was showing where the head of John’s cock was pressed to the silk. He didn’t want to look at that either, so he closed his eyes.

“Not generally, no, but I don’t mind,” said Sherlock.

John sighed. He risked a look up at Sherlock, who was shedding his shoes, shirt and trousers.

“What are you doing?”

“Getting into bed with you.” Stripped down to his pants, Sherlock patted John on the back. “Sit up, and budge up a little, I want to get in behind you.”

John blinked at him. Sherlock blinked back, bent to drop a kiss on John’s forehead, then stood up again. “You look very fetching in nothing but a grey silk scarf,” he said, trying for a tone in between affection and encouragement.

John began to laugh, a snort that dissolved into an infectious giggle. “Oh, Jesus, this is ridiculous.”

“It is. Now budge up.”

John budged up. Sherlock slipped in behind him, bracketing John’s hips and thighs with his own legs. He wrapped his arms around John’s torso and peppered his shoulders and the back of his neck with kisses, and John leaned forward to oblige him.

“Sorry, sweetpea.”

“For what?” Sherlock asked, genuinely curious. He burrowed his nose into John’s hair and inhaled before shifting to kiss the tip of John’s ear.

“I don’t know. For this.”

“Now you _are_ being ridiculous,” said Sherlock, folding his long arms over John’s to hold him in a cuddling embrace. “Your needs are as important as mine, including your sexual needs. You shouldn’t feel embarrassed by your desire for me – it’s more in the centre of the bell curve of normal than I am. And don’t look like that,” he said, although he couldn’t actually see the expression he knew was on John’s face, “I’m well aware of your attitudes on the range of ‘normal’ that fits in the bell curve. But that’s the point. Your sexual response, in the parameters you yourself have defined, are as normal and acceptable as my own. I don’t mind that you are…”

“Inspired by you?” John suggested. He snuggled back into Sherlock’s hold. His erection had flagged marginally, but it was still the centre pole of the grey silk tent in his lap.

Sherlock kissed John’s shoulder. “Quite.”

“I find you incredibly attractive, of course I do. You're sexy to me. But that's not a label I like to put on you, like it’s something you’re responsible for. Just so long as you know that I don’t ever expect you to…”

“Yes, John.” A kiss to his other shoulder. “Beloved. I know.” A kiss to the back of his neck. “A long time ago,” he said softly, “When Victor was stimulated by my body, it often led to me being _blamed_. His insistent advances were apparently my fault for ‘being too arousing’ and I learned to dislike being thought of in those terms. But you have never done that. I appreciate that, and it has left me free to be… this.” Sherlock rubbed his hands down John’s arms and then dropped slightly to rest on his thighs. “What we are.”

John’s breath hitched as Sherlock’s hands glided down the outside of his thighs. His cock twitched underneath the silk in appreciation of the touch. “Sweetheart…”

“You don’t mind that I don’t reciprocate in arousal – you allow it to be enough that I reciprocate in affection,” said Sherlock as he stroked John’s legs, hip to knee. “I like your body too, you know. I like to hold you. I like to kiss you. That my response is not usually sexual desire doesn’t mean that I am not inspired to wish for intimacy. I’ve miss you being able to bathe me this week.” Sherlock kissed John’s shoulders again, lips soft and dry against his skin and his scar. “The balance is in the fulfilment of need, not in having the same need fulfilled in the same way.”

Sherlock smoothed one hand over John’s thigh and over the silk scarf. John’s cock immediately responded by getting harder and leaking a fresh cascade of pre-come that made the wet spot on the garment wetter.

“Honeybee…”

“I love to hold you, John. I love to help you to feel good and to relax. I know that if I’m not in the mood for this, you are well capable of caring for your own needs, but this is not an ordinary week. I’m sorry I didn’t consider the difficulties before.”

“You’ve been…. Aaaaah…” John pressed back into Sherlock’s arms at the light, maddening, delightful not-enough-pressure of Sherlock brushing his fingers along his silk-draped shaft. “Busy…”

“I have. But now I’m not, and I like for you be… satisfied. Don’t be embarrassed by your desire for orgasm, and I won’t be embarrassed by my desire to be intimate with you without desiring one.”

“D-d-d-deal.”

“I want to try something.”

“God, yes, bumble, honeybee, yes, whatever you like…” John’s hips flexed towards Sherlock’s fingers, and then he stilled himself, exercising his restraint, as always.

Sherlock shifted, and although his thighs still bracketed John’s, he pushed his calves under John’s and then, with his longer legs and feet, hooked the tops of his feet under John’s Achilles tendons and slowly pushed John’s legs wider apart. John moan-sighed with erotic pleasure at the gentle control, and his unseen cock got harder still.

“Hands on the bed,” murmured Sherlock, and John let his hands fall to the sheets. Sherlock immediately lifted one hand to rub over John’s belly, over his chest. He rubbed and played with one nipple, then the other, while his other hand pressed firmly down on John’s cock, the teasing pressure giving way now to more satisfying contact. Through the silk, he encircled John’s shaft with a firm grip and began a slow, sensuous pull.

John whimpered, his hips stuttering up and then pushing back down onto the bed. Sherlock spread his own feet, perforce spreading John’s legs wider. Sherlock’s hand dipped down to fondle John’s sac, to tug at the silk scarf slightly so it rubbed against John’s thigh and bum and, where the scarf came up between his legs, against John’s perineum.

“I want you to feel good,” Sherlock whispered into John’s ear, “I love that I can give you what you need, too. Like this. Just like this. I love that me, like this, is enough for you.”

Sherlock brought his hand up again, wrapped it firmly around John’s cock underneath the silk, and he stroked slowly, then quicker, then slowly again. His other hand, he pressed to John’s belly again, then up against his diaphragm, and then he slid it over John’s skin, to once more play with his nipples. Up to his throat and jaw, caressing the skin.

John opened his mouth with a sweet, low cry and Sherlock slipped two fingers over his lips. John closed his lips and licked and suckled at Sherlock’s fingers.

Sherlock spread his and John’s legs wider still, and John moaned around Sherlock’s fingers, loving that sensation of openness and vulnerability while Sherlock fondled and stroked. Paused to rub his thumb only over the wet cloth covering John’s crown, to roll John’s sac in his fingers, to pull gently on him there, then up to rub the shaft again.

“I love you like this,” murmured Sherlock, kissing John’s ear, licking the tip of it, “I love you. Now move for me.”

John’s hips surged up, and his silk-clad cock pushed into Sherlock’s hand, again, and again, and then he began to come, each pulse soaking the silk and making the sticky-wet silk cling with perfect friction to his hot skin and making each pulse harder still, until he was almost insensible with the intensity of it. His head was thrown back against Sherlock’s collarbone and Sherlock’s free arm was pressed right across his chest, holding him close as Sherlock stroked John through the final, shuddering pulses of climax.

And then John sagged limply in Sherlock’s arms and Sherlock wrapped both arms around John’s chest and held him close, and kissed his shoulders and neck. He unhooked his feet from John’s ankles and then draped them over his shins from the other side, essentially wrapping his whole body around John’s.

John giggled happily and snuggled backwards.

“Love you, too.”

“Mmmm.”

“Lovebug,” murmured John in sleepy, sated contentment, “Firefly. Blossom.” He grinned sappily. “Dread Pirate Precious.”

“Captain Buttercup,” Sherlock replied with an indulgent smile that John could feel pressed to his neck.

John sighed and seemed to melt like wax, boneless, against Sherlock’s body.

“There,” Sherlock nuzzled into John’s hair. “Relaxed now. Much better.”

“Mmmm.”

“I read an article recently,” said Sherlock, voice soft and warm with both tenderness and amusement, “That claimed orgasms are good for the brain. Better for it than crosswords. They may even make you smarter.”

John opened one eye to look at Sherlock.

“So you see, I am doing you a disservice by not providing you with them.” Sherlock’s eyes crinkled with merriment.

“I call bullshit,” said John, snuggling back down and closing his eyes, “If it was true I’d have emerged from puberty a fucking genius.”

They both dissolved into giggles then, John’s body shaking with it as Sherlock wrapped him up in his arms and kissed his hair.

After a minute, in which John had dozed off, Sherlock took the remnants of the scarf and cleaned John off with it. He flung it aside and got hold of the sheets and blanket John had shoved aside earlier.

John mumbled something, turned on his side and kissed the air near Sherlock’s skin.

“Sorry ‘bout your scarf, bumble.”

“Not at all,” Sherlock said, “Best use of a fifty pound scarf I’ve ever had.”

John’s eyes shot open in alarm.

“ _Fifty pounds_ …”

“Nothing but the best for my husband,” stated Sherlock proudly, “Now get some sleep. We have to go to Newcastle for a case tomorrow.”

“Holy fuck, _fifty pounds_.”

“Worth a hundred,” Sherlock said, “Actually, there was a very nice blue scarf in Harrods recently for around a hundred and ten which would look particularly nice against your skin.”

“Don’t you fucking dare.”

Sherlock hid his grin against John’s neck and waited until his husband had dozed off again. Then he carefully lifted each of John’s hands, kissed the back of them, and folded them down against John’s stomach and cupped his own hands over them, keeping them still and warm and protected.

“You are worth everything,” he murmured softly, as he listened to John’s steady, soft breathing, there in the warm well of his arms.

 

**Author's Note:**

> I read this articles on [ orgasms being good for the brain ](http://www.theage.com.au/lifestyle/life/crosswords-wont-cut-it-orgasms-are-key-to-a-healthy-brain-20130806-2rd8z.html) ages ago. I may yet use it in an entirely different story, because the notion of it is so ripe with possibility.


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